SUNDAY AM: Warner Bros is already planning the 3D sequel. “The franchise is very much alive,” an exec told me this morning. Because this weekend’s opening for New Line/Warner Bros’ ANightmare On Elm Street was $32.2 million — or 15.8 million Friday and $10.5 million Saturday and Sunday’s estimate from 3,332 theaters. (Friday’s take includes $1.6 million from Thursday midnight shows in about 1,000 locations, a new record for a horror flick previously held by the February 2009 rebooted Friday The 13th‘s $1 million.) “ANightmare On Elm Street is a dream that won’t stop,” a rival studio exec emailed me. Puh-leeze, this Michael Bay-produced pic received rotten reviews. In all, this is the 9th in the infamous franchise — if you count number Freddy vs Jason — with Jackie Earle Haley as Freddy Krueger. (Robert Englund as the slasher used to scare me so badly I could never even watch the trailers of the old films.)

By contrast, Furry Vengence turned in a nightmare performance as expected of a politically correct kiddie pic about the environment. Remember when Brendan Fraser had a film career? Opening in 2,997 theaters, the pic was co-produced and co-financed by Summit and Participant Media/Imagenation Abu Dhabi. But the studio claims the $35 million budget went lower after rebates, incentives, and strong pre-sales by Summit International. Even so, this did only $1.7 million Friday and $2.9 million Saturday for a $6.5M weekend with Sunday’s estimate.

FRIDAY 2:15 PM: I was just told that the New Line/Warner Bros reimagining of A Nightmare On Elm Street debuted to $1.6 million from Thursday midnight shows in about 1,000 theaters. That’s way more than the previous record for a horror flick: the February 2009 rebooted Friday The 13th‘s $1 million. Today, Nightmare opens in 3,332 locations and my sources tell me right now the Friday domestic grosses look like a whopping $15M to $17M. So that’s a $40+M opening weekend for sure.